


Manner of Devil

by AJs Bunny (agentj)



Category: E.W. Hornung's Raffles series
Genre: Fellatio, First Kiss, First Time, Intercrural Sex, M/M, POV First Person, Victorian
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2009-10-30
Updated: 2010-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-05 01:15:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agentj/pseuds/AJs%20Bunny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bunny discovers just what manner of devil he has pledged himself to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ever notice how gentle Raffles is with Bunny? Just remember that, and don't kill me when you read this!

> ### Timeframe:
> 
>   
> Albany, post-IDES

  


  
I write these words for more of my own sake than for others. Although it is known, by my own hand, that I had been the partner in crime with A.J. Raffles, what has hither to been known is not the full extent of our partnership. My previous tales do not, I shall hope, betray the truth that would horrify my readers. But this pen does not seek an audience with its scribbling, but simply to preserve the epitome of my Raffles for once and all.

I writ of my Raffles being different than anyone else's. It is quite true, for the Raffles whom I knew was vastly unknown to anyone but myself. Others passing along the street may have seen the glitter in his eye, or the mischievous smirk that tugged at his provocative lips, but it was I and I alone who knew the extent of the hidden life of A.J. Raffles.

It began, just as I wrote, on that Ides of March. With the promise I made with my burning lips, I left him that night at the Albany, the spoils of our adventure glittering and glimmering across the table. As he had requested, I called on him again before noon the next day, for I could not sleep, thinking of trouble at every turn.

Instead of my admittance into Raffles's abode, I was greeted by his porter. And I call him Raffles's porter because he was Raffles's favourite, who used him to play into Raffles's game whenever Raffles liked. The porter stopped me at the gate and handed me a note scribbled in Raffles's hand along an envelope stuffed with banknotes of such quantity, I nearly gave myself away looking for a peeler over my shoulder.

"Mr. Raffles always pays 'is debts," said the porter with a glib smile, hands crossed behind his back.

Meekly I nodded and mumbled in assent as I tucked away the stuffed envelope in my overcoat pocket. I walked off, unfolding the note that smelled distinctly of the Sullivans of which Raffles was so fond.

"Can't join you to-day," it said in a spidery hand. "Please extend my apologies at your bank! If you have no plans this evening, come round about eight to-night. A.J.R."

My heart stopped at that. Surely he did not plan to call in my marker so soon? I touched my breast pocket, feeling the banknotes bulging against my chest and began to seriously doubt what manner of devil I had pledged myself to.

Nevertheless, I paid all my debts with the ill-gotten gains, from the trouble-makers to the landlord, and from the creditors to the bank. I could not remember a time I had spent so freely on items I enjoyed less, yet felt so unburdened upon their release. In the end, I had enough to squirrel away for myself to keep me out of trouble—at least figuratively if not in any literal sense.

For the time had come to meet my own Prometheus. I dressed my part and called on Raffles, finding him in his rooms cheerily whistling a choice tune as he adjusted his tie at the mirror.

"Well, Bunny!" cried he as his reflection winked at me, "You look dapper this evening! I trust your banker treated you well?"

"After he saw my deposit," said I with a relish of accomplishment, "there could be no more jovial man than he."

Raffles turned to me with his own smile upon his lips. "So, Bunny, shall we dine at your club to-night—or mine?"

With that, I felt my stomach sink. Here I was, a man about town, in such disgrace that I had lost even the little standing upon my own social corner. I muddled with explanations, but Raffles had already anticipated it.

"Kick you out, did they?"

"Yes. I'm afraid they didn't like me much when I couldn't pay up on my choice of the ponies." I shrugged meekly.

"Serves you right, you old pleb!" He laughed as he put an arm round my shoulder and led me out the door. "But never mind. I shall introduce you at my club—the Old Bohemian."

And off we went, as if we had been chaps for years, showing me round to all of his old cronies. It seemed that every man wanted a word with Raffles, and I a mere hanger-on the entire evening, trailed after Raffles like a lost puppy.

But I had not been better wined and dined than when my own pocketbook flowed so freely. Raffles ordered the menu, and met with the most choice of claret to accompany our meal, and later the finest port with our cigars. Then someone entered a discussion on the marvelous brandy that the club had recently acquired, which led shortly to my own procurement of said spirits (as merely a comparison, of course). By the end of the evening, any worries about my previous lack of funding, or my new liquidity thereof, was washed away down my gullet.

When the hours grew longer than the shadows on the floor, I found myself teetering beside Raffles at the portico of the Albany, where he turned to me—"Well? What did you think of the club, Bunny? Did you like it?"

"Oh, I thought it was wonderful," said I, my voice a bit muddled by the copious amounts of alcohol consumed during the evening. "Just capital!"

"Then I shall speak to Chesterson about nominating you. You know, I don't think he half expected someone of your fortitude. I do believe he has finally met his match! Who knew that a little thing like a rabbit could drink an old bear under the table!" Raffles leaned toward me with his devilish smile and a sly wink. "'Course I knew you had the pluck in you, Bunny!"

I could not be certain in the haze that was my head at the time, but it seemed Raffles's eyes sparkled just a little brighter that evening. Somehow I knew I had done him proud, but I scarcely knew what I had done to please him so.

"Come up for a nightcap, dear Bunny?" He offered his arm, and with a lazy smile, I took it gladly.

He was the most charming of hosts as there ever could be, even more charmingly so than at the club, it seemed to me, though it may have been the spirits that lightened the mood. He spoke of our school days, and of our adventures. A warmth spread through me to hear him speak as in olden days. True, I was never his equal, nor would I ever be, but never did he speak unkindly to me. I had been his fag, and he the captain of the eleven, but never was I to call him "sir." Raffles he was to me, and Raffles he would always be.

"Oh, you're swell, Raffles," said I, basking in the glow of Raffles's compliments of our schoolboy escapades. "You were always a swell chap. So kind to me, you were. I don't mind saying so, but if it weren't for you, Raffles, right now I would be standing here dead!"

Raffles, who obliged me by nursing a whisky and soda of his own (though I scarcely remember him put the glass to his lips), laughed kindly at my drunkenness. "I doubt you would be standing there, Bunny, if you were dead!"

"Well," said I, "yes. Probably not. But certainly who knows where I'd be if it weren't for you, Raffles. All alone in the world. Running away from my problems."

"Rot!"

"Quite right!" I raised my glass in a mock toast. "That's what you taught me, Raffles. To stand up and be true to myself. Be a man!"

I swallowed the last of the whisky, already wishing I had another, and I'm afraid the last dram had loosened my tongue a bit more than I usually ought to have let it. For Raffles had been watching me with some curiosity all evening, just has he had before our felonious crime.

With the slyest of smiles and softest of tongues, Raffles's concurred. "Yes, Bunny. And quite the man you have become."

I remember the scene still, seared for-ever in my mind. I stood before the bookcase, and contemplated the gilded leather-bound books stacked upon the shelves. A familiar title made me smile.

"Oh, look!" cried I with some nostalgia. "You kept our little book of verses!"

It was a book of Goethe's poems from which we used to read together. I remembered his favourite—the misanthrope—for he was one, he said. But I—I had imagined myself to be Ganymede awaiting the arms of Zeus to lift me from my burdens.

I sensed Raffles come up behind me to peer over my shoulder. It struck me that he seemed to be standing far too close than was necessary. I could feel the warmth of his body across my back, and the tickle of his ink black curls as they just touched my cheek. "Why, yes!" His voice was as sweet as honey, soft and low, and his warm exhale of breath brushed against my skin.

I shivered for a moment, though I was not cold. In a low voice of my own, I said, "You know—it's funny—I used to imagine you—as Zeus."

"Did you?"

I did not turn to look, but I could feel Raffles's heavy-ladden eyes settle upon my profile. I shivered again with a gasp.

"Dear Bunny!"

Raffles put his hands on my arms and rubbed me vigourously as if bringing warmth to a winter-chilled man.

Suddenly, without thinking, I spun round, clasped my hands on either side of his face and—and—

Before I was aware of myself, I felt the moist warmth of my lips against his, and the sound of our breathing heavy in the air. I felt Raffles's body jolt, and I opened my eyes to the sound of his quiet laughter. In my eagerness, I had pushed him against the sofa-table.

In my horror, I looked up at him, expecting a thrashing of a life-time and my banishment for-ever from the man I had considered my one and only true friend. Instead, the ends of his lips curled, his silvery blue eyes peered at me through their little slots, and he regarded me with such dispassionate coolness, it made my blood boil.

"I think it's time for you to go home, Bunny."

Nothing in that moment could have hurt me more. I felt as if Raffles had disemboweled me and left me bleeding for dead in the streets. I gulped for air, my body trembling uncontrollably, as I desperately sought purchase on the slippery slope I had unknowingly thrown myself.

With a grip as fierce as a vice, Raffles took me by the arm. "No. You're in no shape, are you? Come on, then."

I can't imagine what look crossed my face, for I found myself pulled past the folding doors into Raffles's bedroom. I must have looked quite the sight, for when Raffles returned from pilfering his wardrobe, he put a gentle hand on my shoulder and cooed softly. "No worries, Bunny. I just don't want you to wake up to something you'll regret. Here—" he pushed the silky pyjamas in my hands—"Put these on. You can have my bed for to-night."

"But—but—what about you?"

Raffles shrugged. "I'll sit up and read. I'm not that tired."

He left me then, turning down the light and shutting the door behind him. As I slowly undressed, I could hear Raffles strike a match, and the smell of a freshly-lit Sullivan wafted in from the next room.

Raffles's pyjamas hung on me like an oversized coat, but I paid no heed and crawled into his good-sized four-poster. Pulling up the covers to my nose, I watched as the sliver of light under the doors dimmed and heard the sound of pages turning.

I sighed and started to drift off to sleep when I heard the softest of clicks. There was a ruffle of cloth, and a change of pressure on the bed, and I knew Raffles had come to sit at the edge.

Forcing myself not to tremble, I lay completely still, breathing as slowly and deeply as I could. Soft fingertips brushed gently across my temple, then his hand settled beside my head against the pillow.

I don't know how long Raffles sat there beside me, watching me in the dark. I only know I felt better that he did so, and I knew I had been pardoned for my indiscretion. Knowing that he was there, watching over me, I fell into slumber.

Somewhere in that moment between wakefulness and sleep, I thought I felt Raffles's soft lips press themselves to my forehead and sigh into my cheek. Then, again, perhaps it was only a dream.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At last the sequel in which I offer janeturenne her request for Bunny to come away with the Diamond King's lavender ring and exciting first time sex between two of Victoria's most criminally-minded men.

> ### Timeframe:
> 
>   
> Albany, post-COST

  


When I look back on my life, I think of all the things I ought to regret. I ought to regret my life of crime. I ought to regret squandering my family's inheritance. I ought to regret never marrying and settling down. But I find that I cannot wholly regret these things, for I cannot regret that these are all the things that brought Raffles back into my life.

Raffles was, to me, the epitome of my schoolboy days and the pinnacle of my adulthood. He was the guiding star in my life, for it was he who encouraged me to take up the quill again.

That initial foray into crime and the folly of the subsequent evening seemed a distant memory in the days that followed.

I wrote of the dreadful events of that moonless April evening when professional pride overtook Raffles's senses and thrust us into the lion's den of the Diamond King, Reuben Rosenthall. What I did not write was my own culpable madness that had overcome me in the chaotic events of that night.

After discarding himself of his costume, we returned to his little artist studio in Chelsea where we were to return to our own togs and lives as if nothing sinister or disastrous had happened. Although our walk through the cold night air had shored my gate, now in the radiant warmth of the studio, I shivered like an old man out in the cold.

"What ever is the matter, man?" queried Raffles, his arms on either side of my shoulders to steady me. "You're shaking like a leaf!"

Unsure of my own voice, I raised a trembling fist and turned it over, opening for him to see what I had done. Sparkling in the palm of my hand was none other than Rosenthall's lavender ring.

"Bunny!" Raffles exclaimed, his eyes as wide as the diamond was big. He clasped my hand in both of his and gave a wordless shout. "My dear greedy rabbit!" He took the ring from my quivering hand and slipped it on to his own finger. Then with a smile so bright it nearly out-shone the tremendous diamond, he took my hand in his again and pressed it against his own trembling lips. I have not seen Raffles in such a display of rapturous excitement before or since.

"Oh, Bunny—Bunny!" cried he again, pushing my hand against his cheek. "Oh, I said you were the very man for me, and—by Jove, Bunny—you are just the sweet nectar the gods promised you to be!"

The sound of our heavy breaths filled the little room—his from the glory of victory whilst mine from utter relief of our escape.

"Oh, but come, Bunny! Tell me everything!" He wrenched my hand once more before releasing it. We redressed in our proper attire, me explaining all that had happened after his narrow squeak.

"...But it was when that brute Pervis disarmed him that had been my greatest piece of luck," I explained with some gusto as Raffles filled my mug with bandy from his flask. "Not only because of you—in that terribly convincing get-up, I might add—but because when he wenched the gun away from the devil's hand, the sodding ring came off with it! And there it lay—as sore as his thumb on the table with the gun!"

"On the table I marched you past?"

"The very same!"

As I downed my drink, he laughed in that way only Raffles knew how to laugh, and slapped his knee. "By Jove, Bunny! This is indeed cause for a celebration!" He took my hand in his again, brushing the cricket calloused finger-tips across my palm. "What wonderfully grubby little hands you have! I'm only sorry the stone in his tie-pin didn't pop out and land beside it. But never you mind, Bunny. This stone's large enough to sub-divide and share between the two of us."

"Oh, there's no need—"

"Of course there's a need, my dear fellow! You've more than earned your fair share, and besides, I insist!"

I suddenly realised Raffles had been holding my hand all this time, and I looked down at our fingers entwined together. Raffles must have caught the awkward look on my face, for his hand shifted in mine, shaking it vigorously as if we had just agreed to a contract. Then with that familiar twinkle in his eye, he declared that a night like to-night deserved pampering at Northumberland, and off we went down the street, arm-in-arm, in the highest spirits.

We booked ourselves an entire evening. He was already well-known at the baths, and I was becoming a regular patron myself. With the air of a king, Raffles garnered royal treatment for us from the staff. Once we finally settled into the hottest of rooms, I felt completely right with the world, allowing the toxins to flow from my body.

Most of the evening I chatted away with various plans on how to spend my share of the loot. My poor little flat needed its furniture back, as barely a month ago I stayed the hand of the creditors from snatching it all. Wouldn't a little curio cabinet go in that empty spot next to the bed? Raffles, for his part, grew more and more restless of my company, for something—or perhaps it was someone—distracted him.

All the while since we entered the establishment, Raffles had kept a keen eye on every young man who came and went as if he were expecting to meet up with someone. Sitting leisurely beside me in the hot room, Raffles stared rather intently on one youth in particular. Like myself, he was fair-haired, but his hair had grown just over that length of respectability, dangling fringe in his face. Soft brown eyes peered languidly back at my friend, and for a moment I thought the two men were trying to out-poise each other with their cool and calm demeanour. One of the man's lightly tanned arms laid just so over his lap between his towel-clad legs while the other one leaned against a tiled surface.

Beside me, Raffles had stretched his legs out and propped a foot up where he reclined, allowing his towel to open up to allow air flow, but not enough to be indecent. His pale bare arm rested against his muscular thigh while the elbow of the other braced itself behind me, allowing him to trace the sweat from above his upper lip.

I looked between them with some puzzlement, for it seemed as if they communicated silently in some subtle code. I watched as Raffles's tongue swiped his parched lips several times over many minutes. Just as I was about to offer to flag down some boy and garner us refreshments, Raffles stood and said, "I'm going to find a decent glass of water, Bunny. Keep me a seat."

I frowned at his departure, not knowing then the things I know now, but I had seen him before in his silent and secretive ways when we were schoolboys. Were we still there now, I would wonder what hijinks he was planning. Thinking of Raffles and his indelible criminal nature, I wondered if he turned common pick-pocket as well, and planned to rifle the coats of the gentlemen whilst they reclined at their leisure.

Then I noted that the other young man had vacated his seat as well. Straining to see out into the corridor where Raffles departed, I wasn't able to make out where he had gone. An elderly man took up the blonde man's space and rattled the evening post over his knee.

It was quite some time before Raffles returned. I was beginning to feel like a boiled lobster by the time he came back. A blissful half-cynical grin softened his features as he tapped me on the shoulder.

"Where the blazes have you been?" I asked in a tone more baleful than I had originally intended.

Raffles shrugged. "I ran into old Cransburry. He had to regale me with tales of my old glory. You know what a fiendish conversationalist he is. Come on, Bunny. Let's take a dip and cool down."

Having lost most of my strength out of my pores, I didn't object and simply followed him to the pool where I gratefully plunged my over-heated body. Raffles seemed to bask in the water, fully submerging himself, then bobbing back up to shake off the excess from his hair. In he plunged again, his powerful arms stroking him through the length of the pool and back again. I myself could only manage a dog paddle at the best of times, so I simply did my best job as a buoy until Raffles swam his way back to me.

We both had a sensible shampoo, then off to the cooling rooms where Raffles's appetite ran the gamut. A veritable picnic spread between us, and I still couldn't shake the feeling that I was missing something about to-night's festivities.

"Who was that young gentleman you were so interested in?" I asked as nonchalantly as I possibly could before I took a bite of a choice cheese and crusty bread Raffles had ordered for us.

"Hmm? Who?" replied Raffles, spreading caviar on his bread.

I did a fair imitation of his shrug with my reply. "Oh. Just that golden-haired chap you were eyeing earlier this evening. He seemed to take quite an interest in you, too, as I recall."

Raffles made no effort to answer me, taking his time with his food and drink, savouring every moment as if it were his last meal. Washing down his gullet with champagne, he bequeathed to mollify me. "Oh, him! I thought I had seen him before out on the field of play, Bunny. It took me quite the while to place him."

I eyed him suspiciously, though I had no reason to do so. "And did you?"

"Did I what?"

"Place him?"

He tussled his curly head. "No. I was mistaken."

Although he had answered matter-of-factly, something tickled at the back of my mind, something which I could not place, yet the bothersome feeling wouldn't go away. Already Raffles had proven to me he was capable of telling me half-truths and lies. I wondered if it was so again. Yet why should he lie to me? Who was that man but a perfect stranger? Then again, why should he have been so intent on the man at all?

Even after we had parted, the questions rolled in my mind like loose marbles, never settling in one place, always moving, always searching for some other space to occupy.

Unwilling to let sleeping dogs lie, I decided to do a bit of footwork myself. I scarcely knew where to start, so I thought of how Raffles had managed outside of Rosenthall's gate. I hadn't the faintest how to begin disguising myself as a vagrant or anything other than a man-about-town and sometimes poet. Besides, I knew I could never get past Raffles's scrutiny if he were to meet me on the street in anything other than my own kit. So I did away with the idea of going incognito and simply stuck to hiding behind street vendors and door entrances.

In what had been likely my most inspired move was that instead of stalking outside the front entrance on Piccadilly, I struck a sinister watch on the back in Vigo Street. More often than not, Raffles would escort me in and out of the front entrance, but that was typically as regular gentlemen going about our business. It somehow struck me that if one were trying to be more discreet, as they say, one would avail one's self to the back way.

I had watched for a day or two, and by day three I began to feel rather foolish. I had also gotten the unwelcome interest of a shopkeeper who made diligently sure I never stepped foot on his stoop unless I was intent to purchase something.

However, all was not in vain. Just after lunch, I caught sight of Raffles leaving just as I had suspected out the back entrance winding through the streets and shops. I followed as closely as I dared, watching him stop and look into shop windows from time to time, but never once did he look back. Never once did he see or suspect that he was being followed.

I was fortunate that Raffles did not go to a cab stand but eventually he did get on an omnibus or two, and I kept my distance as discreetly as possible. Nevertheless, he took quite the perambulation through town, and as I had already spent more than two days on my feet watching the Albany for his appearance, my poor dogged feet were dead tired after our long arduous trek across London.

After our omnibus rides, I found myself in a less fashionable part of town, and it grew harder and harder to be sure of Raffles's tracks. I would lose his top hat for a moment, then pick it up again down another street or alley. Eventually I lost sight of him altogether, and as I spun on my heel amidst the rough and tumble of the streets, I began to seriously doubt if I had somehow lost him several miles back.

I began to retrace my steps when I recognised the scenery. I was in none other than the neighbourhood of Raffles's artisan bolthole. I sighed in relief, knowing that I had not failed in my attempt after all, and made my way to his little studio.

I stood outside the door for a moment, uncertain what I should do now that I finally caught up with him. As yet I hadn't seen him do anything I hadn't already known about him. He did explain, after all, that he came in to the room at Chelsea once a week to light a fire and make them look occupied in some fashion.

I worked out a scenario in my head that I was passing through the area on an errand for a friend and thought to see if Raffles may be in on his weekly visit. Yes, that seemed sensible. A decision made, I reached my hand to the door was about to rap it with my knuckles when I heard a very unlikely sound from within. Pressing my ear to the door, I strained to hear what was going on within. Very muffled, I could barely make out what was obviously Raffles's voice, then silence, then another voice crying out very distinctly—a voice that was certainly not Raffles's!

I paced the breadth of the little entry way. Who was there inside with Raffles? Was it that mysterious man I had seen the previous night at the baths? On one hand I burned to know the answer, on the other I couldn't see any reason why I should intrude on Raffles's personal affairs.

My desire overrode good sense, and I found myself before the door again. My hand rose to do its deed, and this time, after hearing that cry from the voice that was definitely not Raffles, there was no hesitancy as I pounded my fist upon the door.

Sudden silence from inside made me doubt again, but my suspicions had been roused, and I would not leave until I knew the truth. I hammered again at the door and cried out, "Raffles! I know you're in there!"

I heard a scuffle from inside the room, and Raffles bark a sharp command. Then there was the sound of the door being unbolted and finally, when the door bade me enter, a very young youth with piercingly blue eyes and dusty hair in a state of undress came tumbling out of it, nearly barreling into me as I stepped forward.

"I say!" I declared as the boy bolted without so much as a by-your-leave of an apology.

A brusque hand ushered me into the room and snapped the bolt home. A very disgruntled Raffles turned away from me and lit a Sullivan, pacing the room in his shirtsleeves.

"Raffles—" I began, but I was cut off before I could say anything more.

"You bumbling idiot!" His poisoned tongue barbed at me, punctuated by swirling clouds of smoke. "Simply announce me to the whole world, why don't you!"

His admonishment did more to fuel the fire than to extinguish it, for I was not so easily dissuaded by his angry display. "Who was that boy?"

A white knuckle wrapped the blank canvas on an easel as his pacing passed by it. "My model."

My eyes surveyed the room. Raffles's cravat, waistcoat, and hat lay tumbled about the floor, but there was something deliberate about the overcoat and jacket, and the way they lay spread out before the settee. In my mind's eye, I saw Raffles taking them off and laying each neatly on the floor to kneel before the boy much as I had seen him do that first night into my venture with crime. The cry I heard outside the door along with the boy's own haphazard dress as he quickly rushed out completed the picture for me.

"Oh, God," I murmured as a cold rush of reality came over me. I shook my head in disbelief. Of all the things I had thought of Raffles, this was certainly not one of them. Courageous, handsome, dashing, manly—but not this!

Raffles stopped his pacing and stared sadly at me as I stood motionless, staring at the place where a dastardly thing had taken place. When he did not speak, I turned to look at him and saw the tell-tale signs of reddened and swollen lips, and swollen areas elsewhere on his person.

"Now you know, Bunny," said he, quietly, his Sullivan smoldering between his fingers as he dangled his arms loosely at his side.

I thought back to that night when I had drunkenly kissed him. "Why didn't you say anything?" I returned just as softly as he.

Raffles laughed in that quiet way of his, but without the mirth of his usual self. "It is not something one advertises about one's self, is it, Bunny?" He waved the Sullivan about in the air, leaving a trail of smoke behind it.

I looked to the floor and shook my head meekly. Unlike Raffles, I had no real practical experience with men other than a few fumblings and explorations in my youth, and that was after Raffles had left the school. Secretly, however, when I had discovered what I had been missing, my thoughts had been of him and tantalising wonder of what could have been.

"Well. There you are." Raffles returned to pacing the room, back to puffing adamantly on his cigarette.

I looked up puzzled when again I thought of that second night when another crime could have so easily been committed, but hadn't. "But...I kissed you."

Raffles shrugged over his shoulder. "You were drunk, Bunny. I shan't hold you accountable for your actions in such a state." With a little sigh, he extinguished his Sullivan and looked away absently. "This may be where you and I part company, Bunny."

I stared at his back dumbfounded. The thought of ever leaving Raffles drained the life out of me. It was he who saved me from utter ruin. It was he who saved my life from my own hands. It was A.J. Raffles and no other who held my heart in its vice-like grip. He had found those other straw-coloured youths attractive, but not me? What did he seek in those men that I had not?

"I'm not in my cups now."

He turned and set his clear cool eye on me. I felt shaken to the core with that look, yet I could not look away. I had thrown caution to the wind on that raw blustery March night. I had placed myself wholly in Raffles's hands for I trusted him like I had trusted no other in my life. Now I teetered on the edge again. If I turned and walked away, I knew I would never be welcome on Raffles's mat again. Worse, I would find myself a second time a likely candidate for suicide—but not necessarily by my own hand.

But if I stepped forward—

My heart quickened, my breaths grew short. I licked my lips and did the unthinkable.

I took that step, grabbed Raffles's shoulders, and stood on my toes as I kissed him again for the second time in my life. My lips trembled along with the rest of me as I pressed my thin lips against his full contemptuous mouth.

Then his hands were at my back, holding me, and his mouth came alive over mine. I felt his tongue slice at the crease, and as if he had muttered, "Open Sesame," my lips parted and bid him enter.

Oh, what sweet delicacy! Never before had I been kissed in such a way! It was masculine and demanding and everything the stolen kisses I had experienced with women were not. Raffles's mouth moved from mine and over my cheek to my ear where his tongue made a course of my flesh there as well. Sounds very similar to those of the departed youth came pouring out of me.

Suddenly both of us panting, Raffles drew away and looked down at me. Raffles's gaze more assessed me than appreciated my form. "Are you certain this is what you want, Bunny?" said he, his voice deep and husky and sinfully arousing.

I trembled in his embrace, but I nodded sharply.

The ends of his mouth turned upward, and I knew then that I pleased him, after all. He drew me into a warmer embrace, pressing our bodies together until it was evident that both of us now suffered from an indecent state of arousal. His hands roamed my body as his mouth played against my face and neck, and soon I was divested of my overcoat and jacket, followed by my tie. He pushed me down against the settee and peered at me hungrily as he dropped down to one knee.

"Oh, Bunny," he chanted like a summer breeze. "My Bunny. Sweet Bunny." His nimble fingers undid my waistcoat but did not remove it. Instead the fingers that had both spun a wicked cricket ball as well as done wicked things to a jeweller's lock (among others) now did wicked things below my waist.

My breath caught in my throat as he unbuttoned my fly and eased a warm hand inside. All the while, Raffles looked unflinchingly into my face as if mesmersied. I, too, felt the same and was unable to look away from him, his hands, and the tenting bulge down below his own waistline.

I leaned back and tried to relax, a quivering uneasy cry escaping my throat as I felt Raffles pull my member out of my trousers and into the open air. His eyebrows pulled up to smooth arches as he saw the size of my prick, which was a larger proportion than the rest of my diminutive form. I swallowed and looked down at him, and his mouth curled in that self-satisfied way that I had seen him flash just before bowling the most magnificent game of his life—or just before taking on an audacious caper.

His tongue came out again, watching me carefully as he moistened every part of his lips in much the same way I had seen him do just the other night for that youthful stranger. With a hand on my base, his head went down, and all I could see was his rich, dark curls as he went into my lap and his mouth plummeted down on my prick.

I threw my head back and made the exact same noise that had galvanized me not but fifteen minutes before. Raffles tugged at my arm with his free hand and pulled it toward his head of luxurious hair, forcing me to place my hand on top of it. His hand squeezed my arm until I mirrored his action by taking his hair in my grip.

The instant I did what he obviously demanded, his other hand's grip tightened on my prick and his head bobbed incessantly, making his mouth move up and down along my shaft. I gasped for breath. I twisted his hair tighter with my fist. He moaned, and the reverberations went straight to my spine. It was all I could do to keep myself from thrusting upward into his pulsating hot slick mouth.

My own mouth hung open and ejaculated every time he thrust himself down upon me. His tongue rippled against my erection, lapping just under the head each time he pulled up before plunging himself down again. It wasn't long before I could take no more.

"Raff— Raff— Raff—!" I tried to warn him of the danger he was now in, but coherent words would not come. Instead, I did.

The feeling under his grip had warned him where my words could not, and he pulled his mouth off as I came to my glory. His hand continued moving up and down, slower now, along my shaft as my body shook uncontrollably. His other hand caressed my hip as he continued to kneel before me, waiting as my body flushed and came back to my own control.

I had fallen back on my elbows, for my arms hadn't the strength to keep me upright. With that same self-satisfied smile as before, Raffles stood and scooped me up in his arms, re-positioning me on the settee to lay out fully upon it. Languidly I thought his member looked particularly painful as it strained against the confines of his trousers.

Watching me watching him, Raffles slipped his braces off his shoulders and let them dangle limply beside him. He undid his fly, then bent down to undo my braces and gave my trousers and underpants a good tug, leaving my thighs exposed. I felt a little silly with my trousers below my knees considering the state I was in, but so relaxed was I that I didn't feel the need to question or counter Raffles's actions.

Raffles pulled down his own trousers and stepped completely out of them, pulling off his shoes, too, although his socks remained maddingly in place thanks to his secure garters. This fact didn't seem to bother him, and he pulled out his little vile of rock oil from his discarded trousers. As before, his eyes remained entirely on me, and mine completely on his throughout all of this.

Raffles spread a dollop of oil into the palm of his hand, which he rubbed vigorously before applying his hands to my thighs. He repeated the action, this time spreading the oil upon my thighs directly, before he lay over me and braced his hands on either side of my head.

His smile broadened as he looked down upon me. "Are you still my man, Bunny, my boy?" he asked good-humouredly, reminding me of the pledge I made on that Ides of March.

I exhaled more than laughed, making my shoulders shake as I lay beneath him, already his willing slave to any crime he could possibly name. "Always, A.J." Although I didn't realise it then, I had called him by his first name for the first time in my life. It would not be the last.

His smile brightened further with the glimmer of his teeth, and he settled his warm body over mine, chasing away the chill of the air from my skin. His fingers flitted through my hair as he kissed me, slowly, unhurriedly, deeply. I could not fathom how he could have such control feeling his hard pulsating prick pressing between my thighs.

My hands slowly encircled his waist and tentatively explored his back. My fingertips wandered, seeking the flesh below, which elicited a moan from deep inside Raffles's throat as his mouth continued to cover mine. It encouraged me to explore further—become braver. My hands spread themselves out upon his posterior. In response, his tongue thrust into my mouth, and I felt him press himself wholly between my thighs. Though spent, a tingle of pleasure passed through me when I felt him there so intimately engaged with me, and I sighed with an oath.

Leveraging himself against the settee, Raffles began to roll his hips, using the friction of our bodies to give him the pleasure he sought. I watched his face as he watched mine. My hands closed in on his flesh, and I gleefully watched his eyes close as he exhaled, his hips having a harder time to keep the slow rhythm he had begun. His body spasmed sporadically over mine, and he cried out my name: "Bunny— Oh, God, Bunny!" I had never heard such a sweeter word in all the English language, and I swear I never will again.

"Yes, A.J.!" I cried out to him as I watched his face twist and churn over mine. His neck craned, and his Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed. In an impulsive action, I pushed myself up to his neck and kissed it. The unexpected sound he made inspired me to do it again, this time brushing my teeth against his skin.

"Oh! Gods! Bunny!" He ejaculated with uncontrollable passion, and his hips pumped with the same ferocity. I used my hands to encourage him and thrust against him as well for further impetus. He groaned, and I felt the draw of his gonads and the warm wetness spurt and spread down between my legs as his body shuddered and fell hard against me.

I held him fast, breathing as hard as he. I felt as if a whole new world opened up and swallowed me into its abyss. Raffles's weight across my body, the heat of him against me, and the stickiness between us drove the reality beyond all measure. I brushed my trembling fingers through his inky black hair.

I had passed from the realms of a common criminal into the ranks of the condemned.

And I was happy to do so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Thanks To:** Naughty Tweeters who post scintillating WIPs.

**Author's Note:**

> **THANKS TO:** Everyone at [](http://community.livejournal.com/crimeandcricket/profile)[**crimeandcricket**](http://community.livejournal.com/crimeandcricket/) for encouraging me to write and general squeeing.


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